J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Midlands 1830 > Birmingham and Coventry Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Coventry from the North 1830

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Coventry from the North’ 1830
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 15 Recto:
Coventry from the North 1830
D22347
Turner Bequest CCXL 15
Pencil on white wove paper, 68 x 110 mm
Partial watermark ‘er | 27’
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘15’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCXL – 15’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This slight sketch of buildings and trees appears to be a continuation of the view of Coventry from the north on folio 14 recto (D22345). Andrew Wilton apparently cited this page1 as relating to Turner’s watercolour Coventry of about 1832 (British Museum, London),2 engraved in 1833 for the Picturesque Views in England and Wales (Tate impression: T06105). However, the elements shown here do not appear in the finished composition, for which see folios 25 verso–26 recto and 26 verso–27 recto (D22368–D22371), the other sources given by Wilton; the sketch of church spires on the verso (D22348), mentioned by him elsewhere,3 was presumably intended.
For other Coventry views, see under folio 9 verso (D22336).

Matthew Imms
August 2013

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.399 under no.849, as ‘CXXL–15’.
2
Ibid., no.849, reproduced.
3
See Andrew Wilton, Turner in the British Museum: Drawings and Watercolours, exhibition catalogue, Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, London 1975, p.123 under no.197.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Coventry from the North 1830 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, September 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-coventry-from-the-north-r1148497, accessed 25 April 2024.